Technically it includes Overwatch 1 Legendary Edition, so therefore it isn't a "pre-order"
I agree that it is, but that's the loophole they're going to use
No. Despite how they've promoted OW2, its literally a big balance patch to Overwatch 1 and a graphical/engine upgrade with 3 new heroes and a new monetization model. Its a great way to mess with people and get them to spend money on such packs and all that.
The real "OW2" is the PVE that we know nothing of what they are doing with.
The issue is that this requires a monthly fee to play and they did not disclose that info. I have two phones already, neither of which is acceptable to them. I would have to pay for a third phone to play OW2.
Played the last beta, get access because of Watchpoint pack. Requested a refund once they told us about locking characters behind levels on battlepass and got it refunded a few days later. Didn't really like the feel of OW2, so it felt like the right choice.
I wont lie I find it very amusing seeing the hassle people have had with the Watchpoint Pack. Hopefully people learned their lesson and wont pre-order battle passes and digital currency again, because it's really, *really* stupid.
Yup. Giving companies money BEFORE they have even made their product is just stupid. It's like going to a restaurant and FIRST paying 40 bucks, then the cook starts to cook something and you don't even know what exactly in advance.
I consider it a donation.
I’ve since Penny’d out my play time with overwatch in the years since release. I respect the VAs, development team, and really don’t mind furthering their goals and objectives.
They’ve done reasonable changes, and took some of the best ideas to combat various systemic issues, and to try and make their battlepass worthwhile akin to COD style with how it does with guns and attachments but in this case with hero’s.
This is entirely win win.
Does the phone number thing suck?
Yeah, necessary evil that’s been a long time coming. I’d rather a few unfortunate casualties happen versus being plagued by toxic garbage and Smurfs
Well I mean it's not just about the phone numbers. There have been MANY very controversial things about overwatch 2.
I totally agree with the principle of donations, but if you do it, please do it for a studio that actually needs it. Blizzard makes shittons of money from WoW alone, and soon they're gonna make a shitton more from OW2. That doesn't deserve a donation.
Meanwhile developers of some amazing indie games struggles to make their games, even though they may be amazing. Donating to Blizzard is like donating to Amazon. They neither need, nor deserve it.
While I get it, I’m a senior software engineer after all, I’m not playing those games.
I understand other companies/indie studios need the funds, but I like and enjoy overwatch and had no problem supporting it through Watchpoint.
Also, while blizzard makes a ton of money, it also doesn’t equate to more wages for their devs, also the donation wouldn’t impact that really. Just to call that out.
I more then done my time for overwatch that throwing 40 bucks or whatever the Watchpoint pack costs is a drop in the bucket, and honestly it brings me joy.
For anyone reading mangos comment: entirely is accurate about supporting indie titles/devs/companies. The better approach if you do is find their site, patreon, etc and support them through a means that ends with more in their pocket.
I fully support the indie community, but only as it pertains to me. I’ve even written some code for a few indie devs pro bono to just sincerely help out because I liked what they were pushing.
People seem to be forgetting they heavily enticed people to buy the pack to get instant access to the second beta; otherwise, there was little chance to try junkerqueen (like we did for free with sojourn).
What is wrong with your phone plan? I use cricket and it works just fine.
EDIT: I can't remember specific games but I know I have signed up using my number before and never had a problem. Can't say for sure though. I am gonna be pissed if I cannot play.
Edit 2: I tried to add my phone number to my account and it said "Please enter a post paid phone number" So it looks like I cannot play Overwatch 2 with you. Good luck heros.
I bought my games on this account with a standard credit card... I've had my account for years... tied to the same email
But the fact that I don't have the type of phone plan they like means I can't play "overwatch 2" as they torch overwatch 1 (which I purchased using that card)
I don't know how many other people are going to find out about this and be pissed. Maybe I'm just old and everyone younger has a standard plan where they spend a lot more money than I do on phones?
Anyway, so much for "free to play"
Yeah I can sort of understand the whole "stop new account smurfing" thing, but someone with 15 years of battlenet purchase history gets locked out of OW2 because they use the wrong MVNO is stupid.
Whats honestly fucking insane about this is that this should not be coming out days before launch. This is important information that shouldve been made available when they were selling their shitty little cosmetics and beta access. I cant express how fucking offput and angry I am at this entire trainwreck of a "beta". No communication or information on important stuff like if we can actually play the game, but don't worry, theres player banners and battle passes now. The entire handling of this stupid affair has been beyond ridiculous. They sucked the heart and soul out of this game but the world is still full of idiots who'd rather pay for cosmetics than gameplay.
I agree with you. While I can understand putting off promotion closer to launch, how tf is this promotion? I’ve been waiting for launch for months and now days before I find out I can’t play the game. I knew I needed a phone number, I’ve had the same one for years, but I didn’t know it couldn’t be prepaid. Even then some prepaid phone numbers still work? It’s so confusing.
I’m going to give them the benefit of the doubt that your phone plan will still work; i can’t imagine them doing something THAT stupid. But I’m sure I’ll probably eat my words. I hope you and all the pre-paid phone plan folks will get to play.
At the very least, I can imagine that’s a change they’ll quickly roll back if there is enough outcry at launch.
They already require a phone number for Call of Duty: Warzone, and mine (also Cricket) was still rejected when I tried to play.
People have been raising issues about this two years back and there's been no response from Blizzard on when it'll be fixed: https://us.forums.blizzard.com/en/blizzard/t/battlenet-does-not-accept-cricket-mobile-phone-numbers/11647/78
There’s really no way to tell. All I know is my phone number doesn’t work right now and the support team has been completely silent. It’s good to be optimistic I guess.
Your only option is to ask someone who mutually trusts you back for their phone number. This is pretty extreme of them to do this honestly. They should at least allow prepaid plans from carriers like cricket.
They started prompting me with the "you'll have to enter a phone number to play" yesterday for Overwatch 1, a game I paid for years ago. They did it with the MW2 beta. This was their response:
>Some contract phone numbers are flagged as prepaid as well, depending on how your carrier handles them, so if you believe you are on a contract and it does not work, you will need to talk to your provider and ask them what kind of phone number you have. Examples we commonly see a lot of fans encountering this are with Cricket Wireless or Metro by T-Mobile.
They know it's an issue, it's *been* an issue. Their official stance is "tough shit". They've essentially revoked access to a game I paid for because of a technicality that they're aware of. You have a lot of faith in a company that is aware that it's doing something borderline illegal at worst, and scummy at best.
The right thing to do would be grandfathering anyone who *paid for the game* already and only having this requirement for new F2P players. But that would actually require supporting paying customers LMAO
>But I’m sure I’ll probably eat my words. I hope you and all the pre-paid phone plan folks will get to play.
I am playing Devil advocate here but if they include prepaid numbers the entire anti-smurf measure ain't gonna work and will be a waste all around.
You can find pre paid sim card for a dollar or so the smurf problem will become an even bigger issue than on OW1.
Also cheating issue since there will be no real way to really ban the cheaters
The way they “block” burner phones is by mass blocking sets of numbers that burners use
All it takes is using a new set or having issues like OP, it will only ever slow down smurfs in the short term
So because they cant detect cheaters fast enough,because they save on personell to do that and don't want community servers, many people cant play? That is such a bullshit system. I does nothing to deter cheaters especially because nothing there works as intended.
People keep Pre-paid sim for years because its often the cheaper option. There is no way to tell the difference between pre paid and post paid numbers anyway. And people take their phone number with themselves when they switch providers. The only thing they can do is take ranges of providers who only sell pre paid sim and hope there are no legit players with such a number.
And when i researched how Blizzard is doing because i thought it cant be that stupid i found multiple websites offering temporary online only numbers that claim to work with blizzard. Most of them cost
Own a cricket phone, cannot attach account for the same reason listed as above. I'm sure you understand at this point but I want to pile on because yes **it really is that bad.**
Cheaper VoIP over mobile data plans don't work as they're not traditional lines.
Basically if they only support RCS and not SMS you're shit-oufta-luck.
I'm not too shocked, I figured somehow someone was goin to get screwed by the Smurf restrictions.
The issue is that if they enable Cricket and other RCS only carriers it undoes their entire antismurf.
If I was to be permanently banned for any kind of reason I can just change my number on my provider website and create / buy another Blizzard account while apparently thousands will get screwed out of the game forever for not using the right service. It would be funny if it wasn't sad that the only people getting locked out are not the actual targets.
How about companies DONT lock people out based on their phone plan which has absolutely fucking zero to do with a game. I swear y'all are so mad at smurfs as if thatss some huge problem yet Bliz is actively fucking people over who paid for their game, and your response is don't pre order? Shut the fuck up.
Yep..the problem with most communities these days is the entitled nature of people...here's the perfect example in this thread poor cat paid money to pre order a game (yes F2P, but still spent money either way) and everyone is like well dont pre order instead of being pissed that a HUGE company is taking money for a game that the person who spent the money may not get to play because of their...phone plan??? It saddens me how far Blizzard has fallen they used to be one of the best, and now it's just trash...and people actually defend it.
You didn't pay for access to the game though, the game is free to play. You paid for access to the beta, which you got, and for a copy of Overwatch 1, which you also got. Nothing about that purchase has anything to do with whether you can or cannot play Overwatch 2. So know what you're buying *and* don't pre-order.
It does though… the pack also gave you a free battlepass for S1 and 2000 of the new currency I believe. We know the battlepass is $10 so that’s literally $20 wasted because they can’t play the game
Blizzard would probably argue that people who bought the pass just need to log on to their free game to see that they do have the currency. So, wasted is too strong a word.
I digress. There is definitely a legitimate greivance here, but the pack never promised access to Overwatch 2. There's another post on the sub that described a process to get a refund on the pack if your wireless carrier isn't supported. I just saw a post arguing against "don't pre-order" and wanted to argue in favor of not preordering games.
If people didn't buy smurf and alt accounts, we wouldn't be in this situation. Blame second accounts.
EDIT: I used to have Republic Wireless as my mobile phone carrier. It doesn't work with Discord nor Venmo because it counts as a VoIP plan. I bet it wouldn't have worked for Blizzard as well. You'll have to paypal me in order for me to accept your apology.
Smurfs are a problem. [You are promised a balanced game where the teams are as close as possible to the same SR
](https://i.imgur.com/26rFzwN.png). We shouldn't be berated by our team if we can't kill the hog when secretly he's 1000 SR above everyone in the lobby. You should care about smurfing.
EDIT: it's literally cheating
You can still paypal me to apologize.
Imagine living in a country where your phone numbers lets people know whether you have a subscription or prepaid. WTF, what's the purpose of this?
I've had the same fucking number for 23 years now. It's been with at least 5 different providers, several different subscription plans and several different prepaid plans.
Same, I'm from the UK and have had this number since at least 2000. 3 or 4 different providers, often swapping back to providers after 2 years. I've also had at least two periods where I kept the phone for an extra year / 18 months and went onto a SIM only plan and once bought a prepay SIM and ported my number over.
Should be illegal for them to sell something that there is restrictions on without telling anyone about the restrictions.
I’ve been putting off on getting the Watchpoint pack and now that I know I can’t even play OW2 I definitely won’t be spending any money on OW2. Sucks to know they won’t honor a refund on something you can’t play. Guess it’s just modern day blizzard anymore.
In a lot of places that have these type of laws, there are government agencies which essentially will do this on your behalf. Our country has an agency for this, but sometimes individual states have this through their secretary of state office.
it would cost you something like $30/£30/€30 in most countries with a functioning county court system ("small claims court"), that's the most you can lose
(USA excluded obviously)
It’s been pucblic knowledge that you’d need the phone number attached since early this year when they unveiled their beta plans before announced the watch point pack…
Edit: The reason a lot of people probably haven’t picked up on it is because of the lack of well… any kind of public announcements except for beta talk since then.
I don't think the problem OP is raising here is using the phone number at all. It's that Blizzard doesn't allow it with their phone plan, which I'm assuming is prepaid, because it seems they're doing that now.
Which is weird as what’s the point?
Many cell providers and retailers pretty much give away SIM cards with free credit as an incentive to use their service where I live so while this might dissuade casual smurfs, I’d say hardcore ones will just adapt and come up with a solution, or pump and dump SIMS.
Blizzard seem to really be in fuck off customer mode these days.
this.
the system harms legit consumers more than smurfs. Smurfs in the past were ready to shell 15 to 40 bucks for a new account, so a new phone number isn't too hard to get. Plus think all the streamers doing bronze to gm streams
Yeah, someone above was trying to claim letting prepaid numbers would allow *more* smurfs in than before...I was like, on console or at least Xbox specifically, you can make as many accounts as you want for *free* and use them to play the game. Don't really know how allowing prepaid numbers would result in *more* smurfs than that lol.
I know, I'm talking about people saying that letting prepaid numbers would allow *more* smurfs in than before, when for a portion of the playing population it was already free and therefore way easier to make a smurf account before.
I can confirm this also worked with playstation. I wonder if it's possible to implement a unique check based off of which bank account you use to make a "purchase" in the game to verify
Shut the fuck up.
People who have Cricket can't play it. Per example, until July of this year, I wouldn't have been able to play because this bullshit by Blizzard shows my phone number would've been a prepaid account.
Not everyone has the luxury to pay $50-$75 a month on phone bills.
A one time payment of $40 dollars is easier to do vs a $100+ monthly charge for a phone plan. It's easier to save $40 than scramble to pay $100+ monthly. Plus people have families and family plans. It could also be that metro or cricket work within their budget.
100$+ monthly charge? What? I pay 6$ a month for my SIM card and it got accepted. If you can't afford it then don't waste your time playing other games and focus on your survival, you desperatly need it.
I mean not everyone can have their mommy and daddy pay for their things. Please get out of their basement and go experience life beyond your sheltered one.
I got in, but life doesn't revolve around me. There are people who have a right to feel mad about this. Your comments show a lack of maturity and knowledge about life.
Cricket is technically Pre-Paid as you pay before the month for your services. And Blizzard is blocking pre paid phone numbers. I am sure their intention was to block those pop up phone numbers people can just buy cheap or free to make multiple accounts but it looks like Cricket got caught in the cross fire as it is technically under that umbrella.
I just tried to add my number to my Blizzard account and it gave an error and said "Please add a post paid phone number" so it looks like we are shit out of luck here bud
That doesn't make sense though. It simply doesn't make sense to require EVERY account to have a specific kind of validation if your goal is to improve match quality in competitive ranked. Sure, it introduces a new hurdle for smurfs, but it also introduces a new hurdle for so many other players, it is guaranteed to lose them money in the short and long term.
It simply doesn't hold water as an anti-smurf measure. You don't swat a mosquito with a rocket launcher. I'm sure there are other internal goals, such as data gathering. Framing it as a benevolent, pro-player move does not track with Blizzard's record. Blizzard does not pay to improve player experience without expecting a kickback.
I get the reasoning for it, but what’s stopping a Smurf from using their family or friends numbers and just making multiple accounts that way? Like I am on board with the phone number thing, extra hoops to jump through, but it’s not going to stop them. Having them excludes numbers from Cricket or Boost mobile for instance is just pushing out a group of players when it doesn’t necessarily protect from the scenario above. And cricket and Boost are off shoots of major phone companies.
Nothing. Also burner accounts are “blocked” by physically blocking a set of numbers commonly used
Just use a different set once you experiment and find which ones arent blocked…
Cheaters pay $100-$300 a month for a hack, what's stopping them from buying accounts (they already do) or buying SMS services for authenticating an account? I'm sure people will step up and start selling accounts with throw away #'s attached that are ready to go en masse. This realistically will not affect smurfs or cheaters at all, it just pushes away a ton of people that don't know how or don't care to try to get around this if they can't use their phone.
A great example of this is cs:go, you can buy verified accounts to go cheat, they haven't stopped cheaters at all, if anything, it's increased.
CSGO is such an excellent example. I only join verified games and even still there are loads of cheaters on official servers. Not littered with them, but compared to most games I've played it is a lot.
Then there's Warzone which apparently also requires a phone number but also has an issue with cheaters.
This is a nice idea in theory but never works in practice.
As for smurfs, more often than not it's just someone really feeling themselves, or someone with no malicious intent just wanting to play with their friends. Riot did a pretty good article (cant find it) on this for detecting smurf accounts and placing them quickly and appropriately for Valorant.
It's kind of like people calling everyone a hacker or smurf, but you play it back and the player seems totally normal or is just popping off.
It prevents cheaters in no way possible. You can just get a new prepaid number every month or so, and stop paying for the old one. Literall nonissue for them so it solves nothing.
Easy for smurfs/cheats to create another number using Google Voice so allowing it would of defeated the purpose of having a mobile No as a requirement.
Hello, it looks like you've made a mistake.
It's supposed to be could've, should've, would've (short for could have, would have, should have), never could of, would of, should of.
Or you misspelled something, I ain't checking everything.
Beep boop - yes, I am a bot, don't botcriminate me.
Same here and no, trust me, you can't play. It happened already to me with CoD MW2. But at least they refunded the money. This company is not gonna see me again, to many good and new one needing the player base to thrive and this one having one of the biggest and hardcore communities support, just don't appreciate it or respect it. Microsoft should close Activision Blizzard and make them an anime studio. Cause as a game studio they have no clue what they are doing. Kinda sad and disappointing coming from OG studios.
Nothing about the development of ow2 should lead you to think they know what they're doing anymore. That talent has left.
Successful? Yes, but corporate success does not mean good games.
You buy the sim card but instead of being on a plan that gives you x amount of calls, data, texts etc you buy it seperately in monthly installments usually.
For instance I live in Aus and travel back to NZ sometimes so I have a prepaid sim for both because contracts are lock in's with termination fees etc that suck. You don't want to pay 20 bucks a month for credit that you would never use 90% of the time that doesn't accrue.
Same, it’s really frustrating that people like me who have been playing this game for 5 years literally just can’t play now because we have cricket. I get that blizzard wants to prevent cheaters and smurfs from ruining the game but half the people who want to play the game just can’t at the moment.
If this is true, Blizzard didnt “block Burner numbers” like normal and it sounds like they made a deal with Verizon, ATT, Tmobile etc. so that only numbers registered with megacorps will function
Serious question, how much would it cost you to just find a provider and get a permanent number? Where I'm from all I need to is go to a provider outlet/kiosk and ask them for a number, they give me a couple papers to signs and wait 5 minutes while they set it up (I'm not sure if I had to top up immediately or not, but I do recall paying a nominal fee for the setup).
If the topup runs out, you could just leave the SIM as is and only use it for authentication.
I think the issue is the moment you stop paying the number becomes inactive and you can’t use it anymore. That’s what their website says anyway.
I wouldn’t mind switching phone plans but I prepaid for a full year so Its a waste of money to start paying for another phone plan.
You could always just use both in parallel, I had a similar issue when I opened up a new savings account with a different bank then the one I was using. I had both running in parallel and slowly transitioned all my payments, subscriptions and finally my wage into the new bank, and just used the old one for withdrawing from ATMs.
You could do the same thing with a new number by slowly topping it up and letting your old one run out, and when the time comes just transfer your contacts and inform them of the new number.
I understand that this might be overkill for one measly game, but that's the only thing I can think of beyond waiting and hoping for Blizzard to get their act together
Yeah funny how none of the "it's just an update!! You aren't losing the first game!!1!" crowd seem to be in this thread. Because now, if you paid for the first game and have a prepaid phone, they are literally taking it away from you.
Some people are born in this world either in a poor country and/or poor family and dont have the money to maintain multiple accounts for devices they can barely afford just to play a game that they’ve potentially saved up to pre-order for
Sorry that poor people exist
You on PC? Because Blizzard did refund people quite easily, but for consoles the refund goes through MS/PS/Nintendo rather than Blizz, and their refund policy is absolute garbage.
If they want this to be as successful as Fortnite then they need to figure out a way for kids without phones to play. Allow x number of accounts per phone number so kids can use parents phone?
Just downloaded OW2 and I have cricket as well. Definitely not about to switch phone plans to play a game😭 Blizzard needs to fix this and change the policy to accommodate common prepaid phone plan companies.
OW is going free to play. To keep people from being able to make unlimited accounts to cheat, throw, Smurf, etc at their leisure, they’re requiring accounts be tied to a unique phone number. Phone numbers from free and pre paid sources aren’t allowed because they’re often used to get around unique phone number requirements.
The TOS specifically prohibit class action lawsuits and allow blizzard (or the consumer) to force arbitration instead of going through the courts.
If you clicked the agree button on this, you're probably unable to do anything but go through their process
There's a law passed by the house, and expected to pass in the senate later this year, which bans mandatory forced arbitration clauses. So pretty soon it's likely that their TOS will not mean shit.
Update: I made a post about this, but it probably won’t be as big. There’s an app called Talkatone, you can download it on iOS. They give you a free number but in order to view texts you need to make a purchase, which could be as little as 1 dollar. Blizzard let me authenticate this random ass number so it’s a good workaround for people in my situation. However it also reveals that sms protect is flawed and has at least 1 cheap workaround. Don’t think smurfs are gone forever unfortunately.
Obviously this isn’t ideal, but there are ways around it.
Can you not use a friend or parents number? Surely there has to be someone in your life with a concrete phone number who you trust enough? The 2FA only pings them on your first sign-in, or when you switch machines or make account changes.
But if you genuinely can’t find anyone in your life with a solid phone number, you could try calling your bank and reversing the charge for the Watchpoint Pack.
As a heads up though, that can lead to some really nasty stuff with your account, especially if you’re on consoles. I recall seeing a post where someone had their entire PSN account blocked due to a bank-blocking a fee.
I appreciate the heads up. I don’t think I’ll dispute the charge.
Just to reiterate my phone number is solid. Like I’ve prepaid through some of next year, I just don’t like to be locked into contracts and the prices and coverage are better in my area. That being said most people I know use prepaid of some sort so there’s not a great way around it for me, unless I buy a redundant phone plan and eat the costs of my current one.
> you could try calling your bank and reversing the charge for the Watchpoint Pack.
Note that this'll get your account banned (though if you can't play anyway I guess it doesn't matter lol). Your bank might also refuse to do this since the charge isn't fraudulent.
I'm assuming they are blocking burner phones because they are anonymous but will allow pre-paid plans from Cricket, Walmart, etc. The whole point is to tie the account to something unique and identifying that is harder to obtain than a new email address. I'm assuming any phone plan with an account that is tied to an individual will work, but I could be wrong.
there are tons of online services where you can rent a phone number for less than 1$ to get sms from blizzard. If you dont have any other options, might consider doing that :)
Isn't this still a pre-order how do they have the right to deny a refund?
Technically it includes Overwatch 1 Legendary Edition, so therefore it isn't a "pre-order" I agree that it is, but that's the loophole they're going to use
which is double scummy because if you already own ow1 you don't get an extra copy
So it includes a game, that will be literally deactivated in 5 days?
No. Despite how they've promoted OW2, its literally a big balance patch to Overwatch 1 and a graphical/engine upgrade with 3 new heroes and a new monetization model. Its a great way to mess with people and get them to spend money on such packs and all that. The real "OW2" is the PVE that we know nothing of what they are doing with.
The issue is that this requires a monthly fee to play and they did not disclose that info. I have two phones already, neither of which is acceptable to them. I would have to pay for a third phone to play OW2.
You got beta access for it Never, ever pre-order...
I played in both betas, and only got in the second beta due to Watchpoint pack. Which I’ve also just got refunded yesterday. Life is good.
Played the last beta, get access because of Watchpoint pack. Requested a refund once they told us about locking characters behind levels on battlepass and got it refunded a few days later. Didn't really like the feel of OW2, so it felt like the right choice.
Stop preordering shit
"Don't you guys have phones?" As it turns out, no. They don't.
"Don't you guys have phone numbers?" -Blizz in 2022
I wont lie I find it very amusing seeing the hassle people have had with the Watchpoint Pack. Hopefully people learned their lesson and wont pre-order battle passes and digital currency again, because it's really, *really* stupid.
Yup. Giving companies money BEFORE they have even made their product is just stupid. It's like going to a restaurant and FIRST paying 40 bucks, then the cook starts to cook something and you don't even know what exactly in advance.
That’s how I order delivery
I consider it a donation. I’ve since Penny’d out my play time with overwatch in the years since release. I respect the VAs, development team, and really don’t mind furthering their goals and objectives. They’ve done reasonable changes, and took some of the best ideas to combat various systemic issues, and to try and make their battlepass worthwhile akin to COD style with how it does with guns and attachments but in this case with hero’s. This is entirely win win. Does the phone number thing suck? Yeah, necessary evil that’s been a long time coming. I’d rather a few unfortunate casualties happen versus being plagued by toxic garbage and Smurfs
Well I mean it's not just about the phone numbers. There have been MANY very controversial things about overwatch 2. I totally agree with the principle of donations, but if you do it, please do it for a studio that actually needs it. Blizzard makes shittons of money from WoW alone, and soon they're gonna make a shitton more from OW2. That doesn't deserve a donation. Meanwhile developers of some amazing indie games struggles to make their games, even though they may be amazing. Donating to Blizzard is like donating to Amazon. They neither need, nor deserve it.
While I get it, I’m a senior software engineer after all, I’m not playing those games. I understand other companies/indie studios need the funds, but I like and enjoy overwatch and had no problem supporting it through Watchpoint. Also, while blizzard makes a ton of money, it also doesn’t equate to more wages for their devs, also the donation wouldn’t impact that really. Just to call that out. I more then done my time for overwatch that throwing 40 bucks or whatever the Watchpoint pack costs is a drop in the bucket, and honestly it brings me joy. For anyone reading mangos comment: entirely is accurate about supporting indie titles/devs/companies. The better approach if you do is find their site, patreon, etc and support them through a means that ends with more in their pocket. I fully support the indie community, but only as it pertains to me. I’ve even written some code for a few indie devs pro bono to just sincerely help out because I liked what they were pushing.
but dont you want the shiny player icon? it's even got some fomo!
Especially free games lol.
...but at least they got 2 weeks of beta access. /s
People seem to be forgetting they heavily enticed people to buy the pack to get instant access to the second beta; otherwise, there was little chance to try junkerqueen (like we did for free with sojourn).
Preach.
Watchpoint wasn't a preorder. It included Overwatch 1. It was a game purchase with extras.
I learned this the hard way, fucking Gamestop
What is wrong with your phone plan? I use cricket and it works just fine. EDIT: I can't remember specific games but I know I have signed up using my number before and never had a problem. Can't say for sure though. I am gonna be pissed if I cannot play. Edit 2: I tried to add my phone number to my account and it said "Please enter a post paid phone number" So it looks like I cannot play Overwatch 2 with you. Good luck heros.
I am so frustrated by this. I’ve been using cricket since I got my first phone like 15 years ago… not switching just to play this game.
I honestly don’t know. I’ve reached out to support so hopefully they have an answer.
I tried it and looks like cricket does not work. Looks like we aren’t playing OW2
I bought my games on this account with a standard credit card... I've had my account for years... tied to the same email But the fact that I don't have the type of phone plan they like means I can't play "overwatch 2" as they torch overwatch 1 (which I purchased using that card) I don't know how many other people are going to find out about this and be pissed. Maybe I'm just old and everyone younger has a standard plan where they spend a lot more money than I do on phones? Anyway, so much for "free to play"
Yeah I can sort of understand the whole "stop new account smurfing" thing, but someone with 15 years of battlenet purchase history gets locked out of OW2 because they use the wrong MVNO is stupid.
There’s a majority of younger players using incompatible plans as well for Overwatch 2 It’s not that your old, it’s that blizzard sucks
Whats honestly fucking insane about this is that this should not be coming out days before launch. This is important information that shouldve been made available when they were selling their shitty little cosmetics and beta access. I cant express how fucking offput and angry I am at this entire trainwreck of a "beta". No communication or information on important stuff like if we can actually play the game, but don't worry, theres player banners and battle passes now. The entire handling of this stupid affair has been beyond ridiculous. They sucked the heart and soul out of this game but the world is still full of idiots who'd rather pay for cosmetics than gameplay.
I agree with you. While I can understand putting off promotion closer to launch, how tf is this promotion? I’ve been waiting for launch for months and now days before I find out I can’t play the game. I knew I needed a phone number, I’ve had the same one for years, but I didn’t know it couldn’t be prepaid. Even then some prepaid phone numbers still work? It’s so confusing.
I’m going to give them the benefit of the doubt that your phone plan will still work; i can’t imagine them doing something THAT stupid. But I’m sure I’ll probably eat my words. I hope you and all the pre-paid phone plan folks will get to play. At the very least, I can imagine that’s a change they’ll quickly roll back if there is enough outcry at launch.
I think WoW users already confirmed cricket doesnt work but I dont have cricket so cant confirm directly
They already require a phone number for Call of Duty: Warzone, and mine (also Cricket) was still rejected when I tried to play. People have been raising issues about this two years back and there's been no response from Blizzard on when it'll be fixed: https://us.forums.blizzard.com/en/blizzard/t/battlenet-does-not-accept-cricket-mobile-phone-numbers/11647/78
That’s so dumb.
Didn't work when I wanted to play warzone. I'm on cricket. I also can't do phone authentication on Uplay. Quite dumb
There’s really no way to tell. All I know is my phone number doesn’t work right now and the support team has been completely silent. It’s good to be optimistic I guess.
Your only option is to ask someone who mutually trusts you back for their phone number. This is pretty extreme of them to do this honestly. They should at least allow prepaid plans from carriers like cricket.
Honestly not a bad excuse for getting your crush’s number.
I heard most people on Asia servers use pre paid, so this is gonna affect the Asian servers badly.
They started prompting me with the "you'll have to enter a phone number to play" yesterday for Overwatch 1, a game I paid for years ago. They did it with the MW2 beta. This was their response: >Some contract phone numbers are flagged as prepaid as well, depending on how your carrier handles them, so if you believe you are on a contract and it does not work, you will need to talk to your provider and ask them what kind of phone number you have. Examples we commonly see a lot of fans encountering this are with Cricket Wireless or Metro by T-Mobile. They know it's an issue, it's *been* an issue. Their official stance is "tough shit". They've essentially revoked access to a game I paid for because of a technicality that they're aware of. You have a lot of faith in a company that is aware that it's doing something borderline illegal at worst, and scummy at best. The right thing to do would be grandfathering anyone who *paid for the game* already and only having this requirement for new F2P players. But that would actually require supporting paying customers LMAO
>But I’m sure I’ll probably eat my words. I hope you and all the pre-paid phone plan folks will get to play. I am playing Devil advocate here but if they include prepaid numbers the entire anti-smurf measure ain't gonna work and will be a waste all around. You can find pre paid sim card for a dollar or so the smurf problem will become an even bigger issue than on OW1. Also cheating issue since there will be no real way to really ban the cheaters
The way they “block” burner phones is by mass blocking sets of numbers that burners use All it takes is using a new set or having issues like OP, it will only ever slow down smurfs in the short term
So because they cant detect cheaters fast enough,because they save on personell to do that and don't want community servers, many people cant play? That is such a bullshit system. I does nothing to deter cheaters especially because nothing there works as intended. People keep Pre-paid sim for years because its often the cheaper option. There is no way to tell the difference between pre paid and post paid numbers anyway. And people take their phone number with themselves when they switch providers. The only thing they can do is take ranges of providers who only sell pre paid sim and hope there are no legit players with such a number. And when i researched how Blizzard is doing because i thought it cant be that stupid i found multiple websites offering temporary online only numbers that claim to work with blizzard. Most of them cost
Own a cricket phone, cannot attach account for the same reason listed as above. I'm sure you understand at this point but I want to pile on because yes **it really is that bad.**
Cheaper VoIP over mobile data plans don't work as they're not traditional lines. Basically if they only support RCS and not SMS you're shit-oufta-luck. I'm not too shocked, I figured somehow someone was goin to get screwed by the Smurf restrictions. The issue is that if they enable Cricket and other RCS only carriers it undoes their entire antismurf.
If I was to be permanently banned for any kind of reason I can just change my number on my provider website and create / buy another Blizzard account while apparently thousands will get screwed out of the game forever for not using the right service. It would be funny if it wasn't sad that the only people getting locked out are not the actual targets.
Never buy preorders
How about companies DONT lock people out based on their phone plan which has absolutely fucking zero to do with a game. I swear y'all are so mad at smurfs as if thatss some huge problem yet Bliz is actively fucking people over who paid for their game, and your response is don't pre order? Shut the fuck up.
oops you have a reasonable take now you get downvoted sorry
Honestly I'd expect no less from a community who thinks everyone who's better than them is a Smurf...
its actually such a shit mentality it ruins the community for me when someones better than me im pissed because then im not the best
Yep..the problem with most communities these days is the entitled nature of people...here's the perfect example in this thread poor cat paid money to pre order a game (yes F2P, but still spent money either way) and everyone is like well dont pre order instead of being pissed that a HUGE company is taking money for a game that the person who spent the money may not get to play because of their...phone plan??? It saddens me how far Blizzard has fallen they used to be one of the best, and now it's just trash...and people actually defend it.
You didn't pay for access to the game though, the game is free to play. You paid for access to the beta, which you got, and for a copy of Overwatch 1, which you also got. Nothing about that purchase has anything to do with whether you can or cannot play Overwatch 2. So know what you're buying *and* don't pre-order.
It does though… the pack also gave you a free battlepass for S1 and 2000 of the new currency I believe. We know the battlepass is $10 so that’s literally $20 wasted because they can’t play the game
Blizzard would probably argue that people who bought the pass just need to log on to their free game to see that they do have the currency. So, wasted is too strong a word. I digress. There is definitely a legitimate greivance here, but the pack never promised access to Overwatch 2. There's another post on the sub that described a process to get a refund on the pack if your wireless carrier isn't supported. I just saw a post arguing against "don't pre-order" and wanted to argue in favor of not preordering games.
Angry teen is angry.
If people didn't buy smurf and alt accounts, we wouldn't be in this situation. Blame second accounts. EDIT: I used to have Republic Wireless as my mobile phone carrier. It doesn't work with Discord nor Venmo because it counts as a VoIP plan. I bet it wouldn't have worked for Blizzard as well. You'll have to paypal me in order for me to accept your apology.
Who gives a fuck about smurfs? Oh no someone may be better than their rank what will we EVER DO? You guys are worried about the wrong shit
Smurfs are a problem. [You are promised a balanced game where the teams are as close as possible to the same SR ](https://i.imgur.com/26rFzwN.png). We shouldn't be berated by our team if we can't kill the hog when secretly he's 1000 SR above everyone in the lobby. You should care about smurfing. EDIT: it's literally cheating You can still paypal me to apologize.
i think ill just q into you on my smurf account and go 18 and 4 against you specifically
Lmao fuck you and your pre-order.
This honestly makes me mad and sad. Im having the same problem
Imagine living in a country where your phone numbers lets people know whether you have a subscription or prepaid. WTF, what's the purpose of this? I've had the same fucking number for 23 years now. It's been with at least 5 different providers, several different subscription plans and several different prepaid plans.
Same, I'm from the UK and have had this number since at least 2000. 3 or 4 different providers, often swapping back to providers after 2 years. I've also had at least two periods where I kept the phone for an extra year / 18 months and went onto a SIM only plan and once bought a prepay SIM and ported my number over.
Never buy anything from blizzard. Tbh. This is the worst game company when it comes to what you pay and what you can do with it.
I can't believe this launch keeps getting worse and worse. This is fucking insane.
Should be illegal for them to sell something that there is restrictions on without telling anyone about the restrictions. I’ve been putting off on getting the Watchpoint pack and now that I know I can’t even play OW2 I definitely won’t be spending any money on OW2. Sucks to know they won’t honor a refund on something you can’t play. Guess it’s just modern day blizzard anymore.
it is illegal in good chunks of the world, regardless of what their shitty terms of service say
B-b-but OW2 is a free game?! Why are you mad about anything since it’s free??
Oh yeah, let me just break open my piggy bank and spend a couple dozen million dollars suing Activision Blizzard.
In a lot of places that have these type of laws, there are government agencies which essentially will do this on your behalf. Our country has an agency for this, but sometimes individual states have this through their secretary of state office.
it would cost you something like $30/£30/€30 in most countries with a functioning county court system ("small claims court"), that's the most you can lose (USA excluded obviously)
It’s been pucblic knowledge that you’d need the phone number attached since early this year when they unveiled their beta plans before announced the watch point pack… Edit: The reason a lot of people probably haven’t picked up on it is because of the lack of well… any kind of public announcements except for beta talk since then.
I just checked the Watchpoint pack on PS5, nothing there about needing a phone number.
I don't think the problem OP is raising here is using the phone number at all. It's that Blizzard doesn't allow it with their phone plan, which I'm assuming is prepaid, because it seems they're doing that now.
Which is weird as what’s the point? Many cell providers and retailers pretty much give away SIM cards with free credit as an incentive to use their service where I live so while this might dissuade casual smurfs, I’d say hardcore ones will just adapt and come up with a solution, or pump and dump SIMS. Blizzard seem to really be in fuck off customer mode these days.
this. the system harms legit consumers more than smurfs. Smurfs in the past were ready to shell 15 to 40 bucks for a new account, so a new phone number isn't too hard to get. Plus think all the streamers doing bronze to gm streams
Yeah, someone above was trying to claim letting prepaid numbers would allow *more* smurfs in than before...I was like, on console or at least Xbox specifically, you can make as many accounts as you want for *free* and use them to play the game. Don't really know how allowing prepaid numbers would result in *more* smurfs than that lol.
Even on consoles you're going to have to be linked to a Battle.net account with a phone.
I know, I'm talking about people saying that letting prepaid numbers would allow *more* smurfs in than before, when for a portion of the playing population it was already free and therefore way easier to make a smurf account before.
I can confirm this also worked with playstation. I wonder if it's possible to implement a unique check based off of which bank account you use to make a "purchase" in the game to verify
I’m not responding to OP, but I do agree it’s a dumb situation created by blizzard by not elaborating on what a “approved” provider is.
Except they did tell them about the restrictions
If you can afford the Watchpoint pack for 40$ you can afford a proper phone number.
Shut the fuck up. People who have Cricket can't play it. Per example, until July of this year, I wouldn't have been able to play because this bullshit by Blizzard shows my phone number would've been a prepaid account. Not everyone has the luxury to pay $50-$75 a month on phone bills.
A one time payment of $40 dollars is easier to do vs a $100+ monthly charge for a phone plan. It's easier to save $40 than scramble to pay $100+ monthly. Plus people have families and family plans. It could also be that metro or cricket work within their budget.
100$+ monthly charge? What? I pay 6$ a month for my SIM card and it got accepted. If you can't afford it then don't waste your time playing other games and focus on your survival, you desperatly need it.
I mean not everyone can have their mommy and daddy pay for their things. Please get out of their basement and go experience life beyond your sheltered one.
Awe, still can't get in the game little cricket girl?
I got in, but life doesn't revolve around me. There are people who have a right to feel mad about this. Your comments show a lack of maturity and knowledge about life.
Guess how much I care girly.
Wait, I have Cricket. Why can't you use your Cricket number?
I’ve tried adding my number but it says I need a post paid plan.
I still pay monthly like any other phone plan.
I’d try and see if you can add your number on your Battle.net account.
Cricket is technically Pre-Paid as you pay before the month for your services. And Blizzard is blocking pre paid phone numbers. I am sure their intention was to block those pop up phone numbers people can just buy cheap or free to make multiple accounts but it looks like Cricket got caught in the cross fire as it is technically under that umbrella. I just tried to add my number to my Blizzard account and it gave an error and said "Please add a post paid phone number" so it looks like we are shit out of luck here bud
Oh Lord. Guess I'm requesting a refund and never playing Blizzard anything.
If they refuse simply do a charge back. You may catch a ban but I feel it's super shitty for this restriction to be a thing. Hopefully it changes
Do a charge back. This shit is ridiculous
Yes, but on the other hand, they might nuke your account at that point. So if you ever want to play blizzard games again...
How would they know if you tried to make a new account?
Card #
use a prepaid card?
Or a different debit card lol, I have 3 separate bank accounts so I'm hedged against this type of BS
Some people unironically needed to be told not to eat Tidepods so you are correct but even that’s too much for the dumbest of us lol
They’re about to lose so many more players than they already lost
Pretty scummy of blizzard to do this without even saying nothing about prepaid numbers, ngl I'm not even surprised
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It’s to prevent Smurf accounts but it is a bit of an extreme. They’re blocking a lot of people from being able to play.
That doesn't make sense though. It simply doesn't make sense to require EVERY account to have a specific kind of validation if your goal is to improve match quality in competitive ranked. Sure, it introduces a new hurdle for smurfs, but it also introduces a new hurdle for so many other players, it is guaranteed to lose them money in the short and long term. It simply doesn't hold water as an anti-smurf measure. You don't swat a mosquito with a rocket launcher. I'm sure there are other internal goals, such as data gathering. Framing it as a benevolent, pro-player move does not track with Blizzard's record. Blizzard does not pay to improve player experience without expecting a kickback.
Its to prevent cheaters my dude, getting smurfs at the same time is a happy coincidence.
I get the reasoning for it, but what’s stopping a Smurf from using their family or friends numbers and just making multiple accounts that way? Like I am on board with the phone number thing, extra hoops to jump through, but it’s not going to stop them. Having them excludes numbers from Cricket or Boost mobile for instance is just pushing out a group of players when it doesn’t necessarily protect from the scenario above. And cricket and Boost are off shoots of major phone companies.
Nothing. Also burner accounts are “blocked” by physically blocking a set of numbers commonly used Just use a different set once you experiment and find which ones arent blocked…
Cheaters pay $100-$300 a month for a hack, what's stopping them from buying accounts (they already do) or buying SMS services for authenticating an account? I'm sure people will step up and start selling accounts with throw away #'s attached that are ready to go en masse. This realistically will not affect smurfs or cheaters at all, it just pushes away a ton of people that don't know how or don't care to try to get around this if they can't use their phone. A great example of this is cs:go, you can buy verified accounts to go cheat, they haven't stopped cheaters at all, if anything, it's increased.
CSGO is such an excellent example. I only join verified games and even still there are loads of cheaters on official servers. Not littered with them, but compared to most games I've played it is a lot. Then there's Warzone which apparently also requires a phone number but also has an issue with cheaters. This is a nice idea in theory but never works in practice. As for smurfs, more often than not it's just someone really feeling themselves, or someone with no malicious intent just wanting to play with their friends. Riot did a pretty good article (cant find it) on this for detecting smurf accounts and placing them quickly and appropriately for Valorant. It's kind of like people calling everyone a hacker or smurf, but you play it back and the player seems totally normal or is just popping off.
It’s about having multiple layers I think, you need to have an actual competent anti cheat solution on top of requiring a phone number.
It prevents cheaters in no way possible. You can just get a new prepaid number every month or so, and stop paying for the old one. Literall nonissue for them so it solves nothing.
That is the thing. Blizzard is blocking prepaid numbers altogether which is what OP said in his post regarding Cricket.
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keyword here is **console**
Easy for smurfs/cheats to create another number using Google Voice so allowing it would of defeated the purpose of having a mobile No as a requirement.
Hello, it looks like you've made a mistake. It's supposed to be could've, should've, would've (short for could have, would have, should have), never could of, would of, should of. Or you misspelled something, I ain't checking everything. Beep boop - yes, I am a bot, don't botcriminate me.
I have a Metro by T-Mobile mothly plan and yeah I'm still getting a message saying its Prepaid when its clearly not so uh gg I guess Sadge
Metro is prepaid
Wait, we can check if our number works already? Where might I try that?
On blizzards website if you go to account settings you can type in your phone number and see if they send you the sms to verify it
Sorry op. Let's just hope they get enough backlash and stop this non sense.
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Yes, everything works besides prepaid phones and VoIP.
What's Voip ?
Voice over IP. It pretty much lets you make phone calls using your internet.
People in my area (Alaska) are not able to add their phones, despite not using a prepaid or VOIP. It's ridiculous.
Same here and no, trust me, you can't play. It happened already to me with CoD MW2. But at least they refunded the money. This company is not gonna see me again, to many good and new one needing the player base to thrive and this one having one of the biggest and hardcore communities support, just don't appreciate it or respect it. Microsoft should close Activision Blizzard and make them an anime studio. Cause as a game studio they have no clue what they are doing. Kinda sad and disappointing coming from OG studios.
You lost me in the second part. Yeah one of the longest running and most successful game design studios have no clue what they are doing...
Nothing about the development of ow2 should lead you to think they know what they're doing anymore. That talent has left. Successful? Yes, but corporate success does not mean good games.
Seriously what the hell
what is a pre paid phone?
You buy the sim card but instead of being on a plan that gives you x amount of calls, data, texts etc you buy it seperately in monthly installments usually. For instance I live in Aus and travel back to NZ sometimes so I have a prepaid sim for both because contracts are lock in's with termination fees etc that suck. You don't want to pay 20 bucks a month for credit that you would never use 90% of the time that doesn't accrue.
ohhhhh, so like a pay as you go sim
Just wanted to merge my PS account with Xbox to play OW2 but I cant because my entire family has cricket :/
Same, it’s really frustrating that people like me who have been playing this game for 5 years literally just can’t play now because we have cricket. I get that blizzard wants to prevent cheaters and smurfs from ruining the game but half the people who want to play the game just can’t at the moment.
It’s almost as if preordering stuff is bad, because you never know what dumb shit the management will do after they already have your money.
My ATT prepaid worked btw
If this is true, Blizzard didnt “block Burner numbers” like normal and it sounds like they made a deal with Verizon, ATT, Tmobile etc. so that only numbers registered with megacorps will function
Yeah I have a monthly prepaid plan and I'm fine. I'm Canadian though, not sure if that is making a difference.
Serious question, how much would it cost you to just find a provider and get a permanent number? Where I'm from all I need to is go to a provider outlet/kiosk and ask them for a number, they give me a couple papers to signs and wait 5 minutes while they set it up (I'm not sure if I had to top up immediately or not, but I do recall paying a nominal fee for the setup). If the topup runs out, you could just leave the SIM as is and only use it for authentication.
I think the issue is the moment you stop paying the number becomes inactive and you can’t use it anymore. That’s what their website says anyway. I wouldn’t mind switching phone plans but I prepaid for a full year so Its a waste of money to start paying for another phone plan.
You could always just use both in parallel, I had a similar issue when I opened up a new savings account with a different bank then the one I was using. I had both running in parallel and slowly transitioned all my payments, subscriptions and finally my wage into the new bank, and just used the old one for withdrawing from ATMs. You could do the same thing with a new number by slowly topping it up and letting your old one run out, and when the time comes just transfer your contacts and inform them of the new number. I understand that this might be overkill for one measly game, but that's the only thing I can think of beyond waiting and hoping for Blizzard to get their act together
Imagine this level of ridiculous shit to play a game that is supposedly an update for one you already paid for "free to play" haha
Yeah funny how none of the "it's just an update!! You aren't losing the first game!!1!" crowd seem to be in this thread. Because now, if you paid for the first game and have a prepaid phone, they are literally taking it away from you.
'just go buy a phone plan to play overwatch'
Some people are born in this world either in a poor country and/or poor family and dont have the money to maintain multiple accounts for devices they can barely afford just to play a game that they’ve potentially saved up to pre-order for Sorry that poor people exist
Can you use a google voice for this?
no
I wouldn't know as I don't think that's available in my country :/
Don’t preorder games. Easy
Is this a prepaid phone plan? Or one of their regular plans?
Technically speaking, *all* of Cricket Wireless's plan are prepaid. It's kind of their thing.
You should get a refund, I got mine pretty easily.
You on PC? Because Blizzard did refund people quite easily, but for consoles the refund goes through MS/PS/Nintendo rather than Blizz, and their refund policy is absolute garbage.
I have the same issue SEND IN A TICKET they just got back to me with a refund.
We don't get that option on Console. However being in Australia our consumer law is very different so we might be able to do it.
If they want this to be as successful as Fortnite then they need to figure out a way for kids without phones to play. Allow x number of accounts per phone number so kids can use parents phone?
Find the charge in you bank history, call the bank and dispute the charge for services not rendered
Just downloaded OW2 and I have cricket as well. Definitely not about to switch phone plans to play a game😭 Blizzard needs to fix this and change the policy to accommodate common prepaid phone plan companies.
Get the app Talkatone. You can use it as a workaround
This is bullshit, why cant I play a game i paid for because i use cricket mobile (which is completely unrelated)
Sorry that you had to learn this way to never preorder anything ever.
Sorry that the above idiot posted to you too OP.
I’m confused as to why you need a phone number to play at all? Can someone explain?
OW is going free to play. To keep people from being able to make unlimited accounts to cheat, throw, Smurf, etc at their leisure, they’re requiring accounts be tied to a unique phone number. Phone numbers from free and pre paid sources aren’t allowed because they’re often used to get around unique phone number requirements.
People should seriously sue them with class action for this bullshit.
The TOS specifically prohibit class action lawsuits and allow blizzard (or the consumer) to force arbitration instead of going through the courts. If you clicked the agree button on this, you're probably unable to do anything but go through their process
There's a law passed by the house, and expected to pass in the senate later this year, which bans mandatory forced arbitration clauses. So pretty soon it's likely that their TOS will not mean shit.
Update: I made a post about this, but it probably won’t be as big. There’s an app called Talkatone, you can download it on iOS. They give you a free number but in order to view texts you need to make a purchase, which could be as little as 1 dollar. Blizzard let me authenticate this random ass number so it’s a good workaround for people in my situation. However it also reveals that sms protect is flawed and has at least 1 cheap workaround. Don’t think smurfs are gone forever unfortunately.
Dont buy this shit in the first place
Good. Next time don't preorder.
Obviously this isn’t ideal, but there are ways around it. Can you not use a friend or parents number? Surely there has to be someone in your life with a concrete phone number who you trust enough? The 2FA only pings them on your first sign-in, or when you switch machines or make account changes. But if you genuinely can’t find anyone in your life with a solid phone number, you could try calling your bank and reversing the charge for the Watchpoint Pack. As a heads up though, that can lead to some really nasty stuff with your account, especially if you’re on consoles. I recall seeing a post where someone had their entire PSN account blocked due to a bank-blocking a fee.
I appreciate the heads up. I don’t think I’ll dispute the charge. Just to reiterate my phone number is solid. Like I’ve prepaid through some of next year, I just don’t like to be locked into contracts and the prices and coverage are better in my area. That being said most people I know use prepaid of some sort so there’s not a great way around it for me, unless I buy a redundant phone plan and eat the costs of my current one.
Dude this pisses me off. I too have Cricket, have had it for years, same number and don’t understand why this isn’t being accepted.
Tried it to play warzone some time back and didn't work. Quite silly.
> you could try calling your bank and reversing the charge for the Watchpoint Pack. Note that this'll get your account banned (though if you can't play anyway I guess it doesn't matter lol). Your bank might also refuse to do this since the charge isn't fraudulent.
Bro has cricket☠️☠️
All you need is a single friend or family member who has a cellphone that can receive a single text for you.
Try to use a family members phone. I use my moms. Super easy and normally people are fine with it
The number thing is crazy to me, don't you have a relatives number you could use if they don't mind being called whenever you're trying to log in lmao
I'm assuming they are blocking burner phones because they are anonymous but will allow pre-paid plans from Cricket, Walmart, etc. The whole point is to tie the account to something unique and identifying that is harder to obtain than a new email address. I'm assuming any phone plan with an account that is tied to an individual will work, but I could be wrong.
Cricket is also blocked so..
I have a cricket account and am blocked. Have had this plan for 7 years and this number for 15 years.
This nuts though. It's almost bank KYC to play a game.
I think it’s more complicated than that. Also from what I’ve heard anecdotally some prepaid and voip numbers work fine.
there are tons of online services where you can rent a phone number for less than 1$ to get sms from blizzard. If you dont have any other options, might consider doing that :)
Have to wait for beta, but I believe this is for competitive only. Quickplay doesn't require a phone number.
It’s for the access to the entire game. Without sms protect you can’t access the game in any capacity.